


A Promise Kept

by Jairephix



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Revenge, T for Taako's Mouth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-18
Updated: 2019-07-18
Packaged: 2020-07-08 00:51:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19860856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jairephix/pseuds/Jairephix
Summary: A rewrite of the original fic, found here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12033465Inspired by http://busket.tumblr.com/post/164745748113/more-this-is-how-i-hope-the-hunt-for-governor---------------They had promised Magnus, when he gave up the memory in Wonderland.For Julia.They just had one more person to help them out with making sure it happened.





	A Promise Kept

In the years after The Day of Story and Song, Magnus confessed to his friends, as they took time to adventure between restarting new lives, that returning to Raven's Roost nearly broke him. The part that hadn't collapsed left a heart-wrenching view of the nearby rubble, untouched in all this time. The tall spires stretching skyward above it weren't terribly stable, and if it wasn't for the occasional world-famous wizards visiting their friend, Magnus wasn't too sure it'd be safe to travel anywhere near them.

What made it harder was how easy it was to slip back into old memories. He poured himself into his work, using the focus to keep his mind from letting him slip into a deep depression or letting his grief waft over him like cloying incense.

Even then, it still tore deep down, at the very core of himself. He knew someone was responsible for Julia's death...for Steven's...for the people he had come to love and care for. He knew the person existed, and yet he couldn't remember. It kept him awake at night when he failed to hold his own against the questions that plagued him. It made him stumble and fail to stop the tip of his whittling knife before it bit into his already scarred fingertips. It reached out, this yawning gap in his mind, and made him swallow down hot tears of frustration.

But he kept trying to live on, to live past his memories. He had dogs to train. Jules always said he'd be good with dogs. In his recovered memories, that was even truer, wasn't it? His earliest memory, defending a dog from bullies when he was too small and too weak, before he learned to fight to defend himself, and more importantly, others who also needed help.

Tonight was one of the few nights he slept with ease, from the moment his head hit the pillow. Deep and fast, thankfully dark and dreamless. The day had been busier than usual, with training and visiting from his adoptive family. Lucretia and Davenport both left, separately, closer to sunset. Today was a rare day that Davenport was on shore, before off to seek his next adventure on the oceans of Faerun. Lucretia had work early the next day in Neverwinter, more charity work with the Bureau of Benevolence. Barry had headed back home only an hour before, citing a bounty he was going to go after with Kravitz the next day.

This had left Lup, Taako, and Merle spending time making sure the house was neat for when he woke up. Lup shooed them out of the house, intending to leave a quick baked surprise for their friend on the counter, for the next morning. They took that time to talk privately outside.

Wonderland now felt like a distant, strange, shared dream, even more so as they spoke it out loud to the quiet desert night. The promise made there was deathly important, and it had felt like they had held it off far too long.

"I can cast some Divinations, see if I can get any answers from Pan. If I can at least track his general whereabouts..."

"Of course, my dude." Taako leaned back against the house's side carefully, trying not to knock his hat off. As it was, the desert dust clung to the surface, no matter how many times he used magic and mundane means to clean it. The last thing he needed was for it to meet the ground properly. "I'll see what contacts may have heard the name in some major cities. The school has some decent ties, and we know enough people that _us_ asking to keep an eye out for someone won't be too suspicious."

"Or it might be more suspicious. People are going to want to know what we'd want with him." Merle rubbed his good eye, mumbling about gods-damned dry heats. "You know, he's gotta know what he's done to who. The whole damn world knows about us now. They all know our story. There's no way he can't know us or recognize who we are."

"I know, and that's why illusions are helpful like that."

"Then it's just...It's still _murder_ , Taako."

The elf sighed. "I know. And while we've done some really shitty things, including murder, this is...I mean, it's personal. Just offing him with magic seems cheap. Sure, it's easier and less messy, we both know that, but..."

"Offing who?" Both men jumped, turning to stare at the doorway. Lup grinned, leaning out of it. She enjoyed being deathly silent again with a physical body, a reminder of far too many pranks aboard the Starblaster for a century. "Aw, c'mon, I'm not _that_ scary. I'm not even all lichy right now!" Hopping forward out of the door frame, she shut the door behind her. The smile faded from her lips, the simple motion tugging at Taako's heart. She smiled almost constantly now, glad for her freedom and body. Seeing it gone was just as jarring to him as knowing he was a heartbeat away from losing her for good, never to see that grin again. "Seriously, though. What's going on? This isn't for shits and giggles, is it?"

"No. It's not. It's. I. We just...aren't."

"It's for Magnus." Merle stepped closer to her, good eye shining with something fierce and surprisingly hard for the laid-back cleric. That gave her pause.

"What...what do you mean?" Her brother turned away, his face tight. That meant it was something incredibly important and incredibly emotional. She was sure of it. He only shut down like this when it was something that had hurt one of them. "What happened? Is everything okay?"

"Back when...When she separated us, Lucretia left Magnus here." Lup looked over the horizon, at the crumble peaks not that far away, as Merle spoke. "He lived in Raven's Roost. There was a madman in charge, and Magnus...well, he was himself. He helped lead the revolt, alongside the family he was living with. He fell in love. Got married." Her face softened, lighting up with joy. Love was something Lup knew very, very well. It was her anchor for her lichdom, and she had plenty of time to truly, and deeply, fall in love.

"Why haven't I met her, then?"

A cloud darkened the setting sun, casting them into a soft purple light. "She died." They started, as Taako spoke up. "That rubble over there that we scoot past to get here? That's all that's left of Craftsman Corridor...of his _home._ It wasn't until we were in...in Wonderland, that he told us Kalen's name." A shudder left the elf, even just saying it out loud. None of them liked to speak of their time there. "We knew he had been married, we all saw the ring. I figured she'd just...died, when he told Kravitz to pass on a message...like, we knew homeboy was the literal Grim Reaper, and...I mean, he didn't say anything about what happened. I didn't put two and two together until...then."

There was a silence that hung between all three of them for just a moment. Family they couldn't meet had been taken from them all before they could welcome her, and worse yet, stolen from the one person who knew her. It was broken by the small crackle of fire that bloomed in Lup's hand, casting her features into sharp relief.

"Let's kill us a motherfucker."

* * *

It took some weeks, but soon enough the three of them were sitting in Lup's living room, putting the pieces together. From just what intel they had managed to collect, it would be hard to hate Kalen just based on his looks. For what simple, hard-working folks saw, he was a perfect paper cut out of what it meant to cut out a living and "making it" in rougher climates. He didn't look like he had to struggle to survive. Good looking enough, without being outright handsome. Just enough muscle to appear strong without being brawny. All-in-all, an average adventurer body, but without the layer of protective fat built up over his body. It pointed towards him keeping in shape for appearances, rather than by doing hard work, like the people he one-time ruled over as a tyrant. He always knew where his next meal was coming from. However, there were no scars, no callouses, nothing to mar what had been cautiously constructed. 

That alone made Taako hate him. Even if the man hadn't murdered people out of a jealous rage, including his friend's wife and father-in-law, he hated him for not bearing any marks of doing work.

For all the elf's bragging about being the epitome of utterly attractive and having devastatingly good looks, he still had callouses on his palms. Rough skin was needed to handle hot metal, even through oven mitts, or hot water to scour clean pans. Callouses blossomed where he held knives and spoons. He had hundreds of tiny scars and wounds, half-healed and worked into his skin. They were a carefully crafted artwork to endure the worst a kitchen could give him. He worked hard.

Lup's hands were like his, with the added heavy dive into the strangest experiments and thaumaturgical research. She and Barry both had handled raw magic at times. Even now, working for the Raven Queen, the scythe may have been more for show than for use, but the bladed head could snap upright and turn into a dangerous polearm. They trained to get used to the weight and balance of the Reapers' weapons.

Magnus had hands as rough as sandpaper, and riddle with small scars from whittling, and larger lacework ones from combat. Merle's one still-flesh hand was far from smooth, worn palms dealing with the abuse of a garden's toughest customers and the thicker skin of a dwarf. Lucretia had her own, from her years of transcribing, and now with manual labor, as she worked to right the hurt she had unintentionally wrought. Davenport...well, if anyone thought the gnome would be one without callouses, they were far blinder than they should be. He liked to joke that ship wheels were tattooed into the palms of his hands.

Noblewomen wove, spun, and sewed. They still had to learn what their maids and servants did alongside them before they were married. Noblemen still learned to fence or pursued a form of magic in their lessons. Hell, the same thing was true in the other direction, of noblewomen wielding weapons, and noblemen learning the importance of thread. Healers' hands had been worked hard with mortar and pestle, grinding down components to help aid both mundanely and magically. Musicians needed callouses to play many instruments, and nothing cut so sharp as a snapped steel string lashing out. Even a rogue bore scars over their knuckles from learning knife skills. And those were just humans and elves!

Even Angus, whose skill for deduction and magic lead him through school, still had his own scars and callouses, from improper wand use, or a clever escapade, learning how to cook from Lup...or even just being a normal boy and playing sports.

It was something the twins had learned very early on: Never trust anyone who kept their hands entirely smooth. A man who bragged and bore himself up proudly with smooth palms and no scars had never worked a day in his life. That was a man who had others to do his dirty work for him, who took for granted his ability to do so, and who was so self-certain about his own safety, he didn't feel the need to hide or to work at bettering himself.

That's why Lup's plan as utterly brilliant.

And utterly terrifying.

"I'm telling you, this is perfect," she muttered again, checking her make-up a final time in the reflection of her compact. She snapped it closed, grinning at her brother with cherry-red lips. He was illusioned up to look as elven-pretty as she was, rather than the average face he now saw in the mirror in the morning. Still, his nerves were starting to wear thin, and it showed. His hands were shaking. It was almost imperceivable, but it was there. Lup took a breath, trying to keep herself from worrying too hard. "Just work your cooking magic, and 'Sizzle It Up with Taako and Lup' will be a success. And...well, then Maggie's got one less thing to keep him up at night."

"I-I know Lup. It's. It's not. That. It's...it's just...the whole...and--and, Sazed, and..."

She froze, hand tightening around the apron she held as she took in her twin's face. "Oh. Shit. Taako...Glamour Springs isn't going to happen again, just because you're doing a cooking show."

"Someone's still going to die in the end." The words came out strained, like his throat was starting to close over in fear.

"I...Shit. Shit, this was...Taako, are you...are you going to be okay with this?"

He forced his eyes closed, taking a deep breath. This was different. He had his sister again, and sure as fuck no one back here was going to purposefully poison a town to torch his career out of jealousy. He flashed a quick, weak smile to Lup, then drew up the show persona fully. "Darling, I'm Taako! You know--"

"My idiot brother, yeah." With a gentle hip-check, Lup glanced at the closed wooden shutters, listening to the excited chatter outside. "He might not even be out there, you know."

"Yeah, you're...you're right." He took one more steady breath, and reached out to throw open the shutters and start the show.

She was wrong. So very wrong.

In the back, alone and centered with three bodyguards, sat a man with a self-sure, smug grin.

They had found Kalen, first try. Or rather...he found them.

* * *

Lup saw, first hand, how happy Taako was when he was in a performing role. He did it at his school, when working out deals with his fashion and cookware lines. But, even with all that, it was completely different for Sizzle It Up. He was...less flashy, of all things. He didn't use over the top gestures or spells. His dishes were complex, sure, but he also wasn't doing anything hard. He was just being...Taako. Displaying his love of cooking openly, showing the passion that could, and should, go into crafting a meal.

She wasn't sure if he knew it, but this seemed like the most genuine face Taako had ever shared publicly.

Still, despite all of that, she had noticed the subtle shake of his hands, the ragged edge to his breathing if he looked up from his work too long to play to the audience, the way he stumbled over his words. This was messing with her bro hard.

That's why Lup threw out her plan before the time came. No matter what Magnus meant to her, to all of them, it wasn't worth it to see Taako like _this._ He was trying to not relive that day, and it wasn't worth the utter destruction of his confidence.

Instead, she pulled Merle aside in a moment where she could slip out, needing to fetch a particular pan. She asked for him to display some actual subtly and to just follow Kalen and his entourage after the show. 

Lup offered thanks to any and all gods for small miracles, because Merle actually did it. The moment the show wrapped up, the dwarf disappeared into the crowd, and Kalen left before any samples could be prepared. Her plan would have failed in that instant anyway. She overheard some of the people who had been near him whispering about how he said things about the last show this chef had put on.

Fewer people than usual had taken samples of Taako's food, even though many lined up. This was the world-famous twins! They had saved the world! It was like a weight was lifted from him as the first few people happily wolfed the food down. Taako stood taller, had a more charming smile on, oozed more personality into his idle prattle. His hands didn't shake as he signed more autographs than she could ever believe her doofus brother could ever manage.

That's why, after the show, after the crowd had thinned and left, Lup should have realized something was still wrong. It hadn't been just the idea of Glamor Springs haunting Taako. He froze up at an approaching figure, a young man who looked simply plain. Nothing about him seemed like a reason for her twin to shake in fear.

"Taako, what the fuck," came the rushed breath. Even from here, she could hear the strain in the young man's voice. "You said you'd never rework the merchandise, no matter how hard I worked, and now--"

"It's...I was a jackass, but I couldn't...you saw the....but she's...my sister..." Whoever this man was, the pain in Taako's voice wasn't worth his continued existence, not to her. Her hands tightened in anger. "Please, Sazed--"

Ah. She knew that name. Lup cycled through all the stories her twin had told her about his life in the decade where she was forgotten, until he found the Umbra Staff. The person who let the blame fall on Taako, who let him think he killed 40 innocent people. It only took her a few quick steps to meet them, and if it wasn't for Taako's sudden grasp on her wrist, the man in front of them would be ash with her next breath.

"I know you. You're the one who hurt my brother." Her voice was cold. She knew that, knew it from the way he flinched. Good. It wasn't the first time she'd said that recently. "You're lucky I'm one of the good guys."

That seemed to spark life back into the argument. "We were supposed to be partners. You promised, and you broke that. But she--she just shows up and you..."

"Aren't you supposed to be in _jail_?" Lup felt her brother wince next to her, giving her wrist a little warning squeeze. When had that ever stopped her? "You know, for fuckin' murdering an entire town to ruin him?

"Lup, just...don't? Please?" He sounded so small and so tired. That scared her. They were twins. If someone threatened one of them, the other would be there to destroy whoever hurt them. That's how it had always been. For Taako to back down, to want to run from a problem instead of charging in and dealing with it...that decade apart changed him too much, and it scared her.

"Okay. Just for you." She turned her attention to the plain man in front of her. "Hear that, asshat? You get to live for now. But if I find out you try to do anything involving my brother again, your dick is flambé." Taako let go of her. Lup turned to stalk away, not daring to look back. She didn't need to, to know that someone who was literally legendary, such as herself, would be enough weight to scare him off for good.

RIght now, her brother needed a nice giant mug of her specialty cocoa. The kind with vodka in it.

* * *

It was late when Merle returned to their camp, but the information he brought back with him was priceless.

Kalen may have had the sort of appearance and charisma people flocked to, but ever since The Day of Story and Song, the crowds all knew Magnus' name. They knew the entire IPRE team's names, but that was beside the point. The point was, people who weren't full of, in Taako's opinion fully justified, hero worship for the IPRE weren't exactly welcome in most circles.

After that Day, Kalen had gone underground, to become what could be most easily summed up as a mob boss. He had people who preferred the darker parts of the world, the underhanded dealings, and power for power's sake. It made sense. The man wanted power, he wanted to rule over others, so he took it where he could. If simple townsfolk could rise up against him like they had in Raven's Roost, then he craved more power to be able to crush rebellions before they could start.

Taako honestly hadn't expected anything else.

It meant that they now knew where he was, and what kind of resources he had at his disposal. It meant it was also time for the hardest talk. The three of them sat in silence around the fire, waiting for someone else to speak.

"So," It was Lup who broke the silence, looking at her friend and her brother. "How are we doing this? Wands blazing, or...?"

Merle looked to Taako. The elf sighed. "We need to make sure we pass on Magnus' message. That's the absolutely most important part. So...no magic. Not right away, I think. I...I think it'd be better to get a good...good look at the situation and handle it from there."

"That makes sense." The cleric turned back to the fire, prodding it with a long branch. "No use in taking out people we don't have to."

"Morning. We'll go during the morning. There should be less people there, less likely anyone will be on guard. Tactically, it gives us the best advantage to kick in the door, ransack our way to him, and take him out." Lup sighed as she got up. "We can talk this over better in the morning before we go, make sure we have our plan settled then. We can go in properly in a couple of days to make sure we have the best use of our spell slots that we possibly can."

With that, they let the fire burn down to embers as they set up their bedrolls. Merle offered to take the first watch, to which the twins jumped at. A long day, with high energy and nerves wore them both down harder than they needed to. While elves could meditate and be fully rested instead, they both enjoyed any chance to sleep instead any chance they could.

Out here, with a plan formulating and so close to town, the three of them felt safe.

Those well versed in spells and natural resistances know that elves are resistant to sleep spells.

There are, however, other ways to make sure an elf stays unconscious.

* * *

Taako awoke with a throbbing pain in his head and eyes that didn't want to focus. At first, he thought it was a headache from drinking, before remembering he didn't drink last night. The next muddled thought was from emotional exhaustion, but there hadn't been any depressive bout to sob himself to sleep with. It didn't feel like a headache, the longer he dredged himself towards wakefulness. It felt more like he'd walked into something low hanging. 

When he could finally get his eyes to stay open and focus on what he was seeing, he swallowed hard. A chill ran through him, multiplied by the packed dirt floor beneath him. Rough metal bars crossed over the top half of a thick door, the bottom half solid wood. A faint smell of wood-rot sweetened the air.

Through the metal grate, he could see across the room into another cell. He could see Lup, standing with her arms bound over her head, a grimace of pain clearly visible on her face. He knew whoever had put her in there did so knowing the pain would keep her from focusing well enough to cast any spells.

If they knew that, then he could almost guarantee that there were spells on that room specifically to hurt and trap her if she died and went full lich.

That scared him.

"Fuckin'...fuck." If they were in cells, then it was likely Merle _had_ been caught following Kalen, and subsequently followed back to their camp. Because the entire multiverse now knew their stories, that also meant they could figure out their individual weaknesses, and counteract them.

That also meant the pain in his head was likely from getting clubbed and knocked the hell out well enough to keep him here to move. "Stupid shitty...fuck."

Taako tried to sit up from the thin cot, only to fail and dimly register he was half-lying on his own arms, bound behind his back. Of course. A deep breath, and some squirming later, he was upright, peering at the walls all around him, desperate for any hints on escaping. If he could find something with enough of an edge to wear at the ropes, then he could get his hands free. That would give him the chance to pick the lock to his cell with one of the pins he knew was still tucked into his hair behind his ear. Then he could do the same to Lup's cell, get her down, find Merle and get him out and...

Well, really. Hope they had been taken by Kalen, and not someone else who had a use for three of the Seven Birds.

First things first, though. He as getting loose.

Luck was with him, and some small part of him made sure to thank Istus for small miracles. A small, sharp rock was tucked under the cot that was supposed to serve as his bed. Hooking one foot under the cot, he worked at kicking it towards where he could sit and scoop it into his hands. No use making noise he didn't need to make if he could help it. Too many situations back on their home plane he could remember, of him and Lup escaping from really awful people, locked doors to cells like this, bruises and rope burns from captors who were more than a little mad at these twin elves who stole to survive.

This, however, was the first time they had ever been kept in separate cells, and that made him more than a little uncomfortable. It felt like being separated from her again.

Hours slowly passed. Taako felt himself sweat through the clothes he was wearing, working patiently but maintaining the quiet. His fingers were cramped, and he was sure his hands were bleeding from the way they stung. The sharp scent of warm metal was there in the air, but not overwhelming enough to be noticeable. He'd gotten worse by working in kitchens. His hands would heal, and he could work out the cramps in his fingers soon enough. The rock was rough, and would probably be gross enough to give him a small infection if he didn't clean the wounds soon.

That was a problem for Later-Taako.

It was nearly nightfall when he felt the rope slacken enough that he knew it held on by only a few fibers. This was the tricky part. He could continue to saw and let the ropes fall away entirely. He could pull his bindings tight, despite the searing pain in his wrists, and snap the last of the bindings apart, but risked a chance at it being loud enough to attract attention to any passing guards. He hadn't _seen_ any guards, which was more worrisome. Were they out of sight? It was also still too early evening. If he freed himself entirely, he risked the chance of being checked on as he waited, only for someone to notice he was free.

If he waited a few hours, until closer to midnight, there would be the least amount of guards, and they would be lax at best.

Taako chose to do what he rarely did. He closed his eyes, and tranced.

* * *

Lup's shoulders burned. She knew that at least one shoulder had slipped loose of the socket. That side hurt worse than the other, but it didn't feel like it was fully dislocated. That could be a slightly easier, if just as painful, fix. Though, whoever had put her in here wasn't terribly smart. What kind of prison let prisoners see the whole room? She could see the entire room, clear of any guards. Every single one she had seen pass by was human, and none of them even so much as stopped to check on any of them, to make sure they weren't trying to escape. They honestly thought that this was all that was needed: a few cells and to tie them up.

They had also made a grave mistake.

They thought this was enough to stop her.

Lup had centuries of control under her belt. A tiny flame, one small enough to burn without letting any heavy smoke smell leave her immediate area, or worse, making the whole damn rig she was in go up in flames. Slow and steady, working to wear it down to the point she could slip a wrist loose. That's all she needed.

Fire made this easier for her than it would for anyone who wasn't an evocation specialist. In under an hour after sundown, the first rope let go with a soft snap. With that hand now free, and exhaustion wearing at her bones, Lup let herself relax a little. She needed to take a break before she started again. This was hard to do without food to refuel herself, and trancing in this position would be nearly impossible. Exhaustion was making her weary.

Focus. Time to plan.

From here, if she was lucky, one of the bobby pins keeping her hair out of her face was still tangled in the mess. She could use that to pick the cell door open, if she could reach the lock from this side. Then, she'd get Taako, and they could both find Merle's cell. A quick plan would be needed to barge through the place to get them to Kalen. She knew it was Kalen who had done this to them. No one else would be so fucking stupid as to decide to jail nearly half the people who had saved their entire damn reality.

That was good. It meant he had brought them to him, and saved them some time.

She let out a long breath, trying to get her body to relax. Tension was just going to wear her out, even if the tension kept her other shoulder from being in pain, hanging her weight off the joint. Why hadn't she ever learned to cast Levitate, like Taako had? Then she could at least sit in the air.

Spells to learn for later.

As the hours continued to slip by, and being bound only by the one arm, she started to phase out the pain. Sure, her feet hurt, but that wasn't anything new. She had walked until her bare feet had bled with every step, and fallen asleep after her own sobs of pain had left her exhausted. She had died from poisons, from explosions, rockfalls...she had a century of deaths behind her. This pain was nothing, compared to that.

At midnight, a noise startled Lup out of the barest beginnings of a trance, more a daze than anything else. It was the creak of a door hinge, unperceivable unless you were hypersensitive to sound...like an elf. There, just in front of her door. A series of soft, almost silent sounds, like the tumblers within the lock being carefully pressed into place. The door swung outwards...and there was Taako, a bent bobby pin in his hand, grinning like he had...well, like he had just gotten the treasure of a lifetime.

"About time, bro-bro. Looks like we had the same plan."

"Let's go find that other dingus, and kick these assholes' shit in."

"Taako? Ew."

The flame she conjured wasn't so small, this time.

Merle was harder for them to find, for the stupidest reason. Where both elves had been knocked unconscious with concussive force and bound to prevent magic, the dwarf had been hit with a sleep spell and had been out cold the entire time. It's why the jail had been so quiet, and why they hadn't heard a peep from the chatty man all day. His snoring kicked in, at long last, as they started to search for him, leading them right where they needed to go.

Lup had the pleasure of smacking him awake as Taako started to whine about his delicate hands and brute labor. The cleric startled to wakefulness, then questioned, far too loudly, where they were and what was going on. After a series of hushed explanations, and telling him more than once to whisper, it was time to move.

There was only a single staircase leading into or out of the room. Lup took the forward point, as a sorcerer. She didn't need to worry about a spell focus or any components, unlike Taako. Merle's greatest strength was his faith, but he still needed a religious focus for its use. It just made sense for her to take the lead.

As both twins had separately suspected, the late hour meant there should be few guards on alert. More worrisome as the lack of any guards as they would their way up into a small, well-furnished house, chilly with the night air. Was Kalen so constantly surrounded by thugs? Had he set them to guard the entire perimeter of his grounds instead of lying in wait inside? There was no way a man as cunning as he was, was stupid enough to not have anyone on call nearby.

The house was large, uncomfortably so for a single person, if his guards didn't live here. Taako counted doors they slunk past, mentally listing the people he truly cared about and could fit them all here, with a room to themselves, trivially, as well as rooms for people he knew the names of but barely knew individually. This was more of Kalen flaunting what he had, while others struggled to even have the barest resemblance of.

It made his gut twist a little. This man was checking off every box for everything Taako hated about people with money. Instead of doing something decent with it all, he was wasting it by flaunting it, and looking self-important. The wizard ignored the small voice in the back of his head that pointed out that _he_ did the same thing for years. But he had learned! That's why there was the school. Right?

But that was the thing. It was people like Kalen who had made Lup feel small when they were younger, treating them like trash that happened to be in their way, treating a pair of homeless, starving kids struggling to survive as something to mock rather than help. People like Kalen who got robbed blind and stabbed in a dark alley, injured to prove they weren't untouchable, just rich assholes.

Taako felt sick. This was the man who ruled Raven's Roost as a tyrant before Julia, and in part Magnus, lead the town against him. This was the man who, when denied what he wanted for no other reason than to abuse it for his own whims and wring all life out of it, destroyed it.

This was the man who took some of the rarest joy from his friend's life. He had stolen the most precious treasure any person could have.

He stole Magnus' family and home, leaving a hole in him that would never heal fully.

If there had been any wavering doubt left in Taako's head, concerned about what they were about to do, it was gone. Someone like this had to pay for what they did.

He must have stopped, staring blindly and wavering in place as his mind overwhelmed him with anger. Lup took his hand, squeezing it gently. He took a breath, returned the squeeze with one of his own, and forced himself to focus. They couldn't stumble now.

For Magnus.

A pair of great oak doors, larger and more decorative than the others in the long halls were barely cracked open. A thin light flickered weakly. This was it then.

"ROLL THAT INITIATIVE, SHITLIPS!" Lup cried as she kicked the door in. Behind a finely carved desk, a man stood where he had been working, only to freeze in place as she cast Hold Person on him. It was him. Kalen. Merle shuffled to the side awkwardly, not sure what to do without his focus, and praying silently to Pan that the spell wouldn't break and no one would get hurt. At least, no one he cared about.

Taako slipped in around Lup, looking for some sort of bladed weapon. They had to do this the Magnus way. No magic.

"Are...are you sure we still want to do this?" The elves rolled their eyes at the soft, gravelly voice of the cleric.

"Fuck sake, Merle, yes." Taako started to pull books off the shelves lining the walls of the room, flicking open any box he came across. He just needed a dagger. A dagger to the throat, and they could just run and hope they could get out. If the guards were surrounding the grounds, though, then...shit. How _were_ they getting out? What happened next, after they offed this guy?

"We've gotta. For Maggie." Lup turned away from staring Kalen down and watching him struggle, maintaining the spell as she glanced over at Merle. "I don't know what kind of life you've lived since, but for me and Taako? People like this don't change. They...they just don't. They find someone new to beat down, over and over."

Taako nodded, trying not to look at the dwarf. He hated talking about the problems they had as kids. People had a nasty habit of pitying them or giving hollow platitudes when they heard about it. He didn't need that. "Where the shit is a dagger? Seriously, you have this fancy of a place, and you're not decked out with weapons?"

Kalen laughed. "You think I would keep them in my _study_? Are you stupid?" His voice was raspier than they were expecting it to be. It sounded like the kind of voice that came with inhaling rough debris and smoke. Perhaps it had been ruined after he collapsed the pillars of the Craftsmen Corridor. Taako approved if that was true. He was marked for the rest of his life by his actions, however short that life was about to be.

"I mean, with someone as shady as you...you have to keep one on you--" Lup stepped closer, only to realize that her spell had failed as Kalen leveled a hand crossbow at her. She was the closest, could cast spells without components or a focus. She was the biggest threat to him in the room.

Taako spun in place, reaching for his sister. She had just gotten her body back not that long ago. Yeah, she'd have her lich form, but he just _got her back._ He couldn't lose her again, not again--

There was a soft, familiar noise, not unlike a pair of scissors slipping through cloth, a wetter, dulled sound like a cleaver through meat, and Kalen faltered.

* * *

Magnus frowned.

Taako had talked a good game about him and Lup going off to restart Sizzle It Up, now that the school was up and running and they were together again, but...it seemed really spontaneous, even for them. He had wanted to talk to Merle about this, to get the cleric's opinion on it.

He was more than a little surprised to find the twins had taken the dwarf with them.

It was a late, sleepless night, full of nightmares with a face he couldn't remember. Magnus was there, head in his hands, when Barry popped by, hoping to see if Lup was with Taako, cooking furiously in Magnus' kitchen.

"They...aren't here?" The former IPRE scientist frowned, pushing his glasses back up his nose in absentminded habit. "Lup said she was only going to be gone a couple of days, and to come here to get dinner at the end of the week."

Magnus sat up as worry began to build in his gut. Something was off. "I don't know, Barry. They never stopped by. I haven't seen them...they were going to restart Taako's old cooking show."

"I...I thought Taako never wanted to try to make that show happen again?" A drunken Candlenights conversation flickered through his mind as the two men exchanged a panicked glance. It may have been midnight, and it may have been nothing to fear at all. But with no word and no clear answers from their friends, something was wrong. Very wrong.

Never had Magnus been gladder for the bond engine and how tightly their connection had been formed aboard that ship. Not when fighting The Hunger that had consumed the man inside that Merle called "John." No, it was now, when he had no idea where his family was.

* * *

Time seemed to stand still.

Slowly, Kalen crumpled to his desk, blood slowly bubbling from his lips, hands losing any grip they had on the crossbow. In horrified fascination, Taako followed the man's body as it slowly slid from the furniture to the floor. Sure, they had killed people before, but...that was different. Especially since none of them in the room had made a move.

His eyes lifted from the sight as Lup started to laugh, high and desperate. Merle sighed in relief.

There were Magnus and Barry, stepping through a rift and into the room. Barold even had his reaper scythe in hand, looking sheepish. "Sorry, didn't have a chance to pop in sooner..."

Magnus, however, was staring down at the body in confusion, reaching to pull his short sword from the barely still-breathing body. Taako knew that look. It was the same look he had as he had tried to explain he had found himself depicted as a Red Robe, before they knew the color was associated with them, with the IPRE, with each other. With their family.

It was the look he wore on late nights since Wonderland, when he was remembering Julia but was unable to remember her killer's face. He knew the man in front of him, gasping in wet breaths on the floor, but couldn't recognize him. His face was nothing more than a blurred idea of him. There as a disconnect in his mind, and it bothered Magnus more than he could explain...and there was nothing they could do to fix it.

A moment passed in silence. They could hear the labored breathing start to slow, sickly wet behind the desk. It took a moment before Taako said the most important words in the world.

"That...was for Julia."

Magnus started, pulling his attention up from the confusing sight before him. He looked over at Taako, then to Merle as the dwarf echoed the words, and again as Lup said them. His face hardened, pain twisting into grief, then anger. The fighter looked back down at the man he couldn't quite recognize, who laughed up at him, with no strength left to do anything else.

Magnus torqued his arm up and back.

Taako had never heard him say anything before that sounded this cold and pained. Even colder than when they were in Wonderland, and his body had been taken by one of the liches, back when all of this started.

"For Julia, you son of a bitch."

He thrust his arm down and forward, as hard as he could.

* * *

Raven's Roost was quiet but for the soft sound of hammering as Magnus put fences up around his property. He had already built the open kennels for the dogs to stay in, he just needed the space to train them.

Lup and Taako cooked together, side by side and in tandem. They were both oddly silent as they worked, an odd contrast to the usual loud, chaotic, messy, and truly joyous cacophony they usually produced. They were rarely speaking as it was.

Barry fretted from the living room, pacing needlessly until Merle distracted him with some nonsense card game that they had once played often aboard The Starblaster. "Leave 'em be," he said softly, dealing out the hands of cards. "They'll be okay soon."

"And Magnus?" Barry toyed with the edge of his cards, picking at the lightly fraying cardstock.

"Well, what happened should give him some closure. We'll know soon enough."

"When do you think that'll be?"

"When he starts talking nonsense about the next dog he sees." Barry burst out laughing, feeling tension slide from his shoulders. The house seemed lighter for that. It had been a while since someone had laughed.

A new postcard from Cap'nport hung from a clothespin near the door, along a cotton string that spanned the circumference of the living room. It was the latest update from his sea journeys around the world. He talked about how it felt like one of the planes they had visited during their century aboard the ship they called home and reminisced about their time there. He promised he'd stop by in time for Candlenights, with gifts from all around the globe for all of them.

Lucretia was due to arrive this evening to update them all on the rebuilding efforts and share her latest tea find with them. She had been finding newer, more unique blends, matching them all perfectly to her most recent portraits. No matter what she brought, Lup and Taako would have the absolute perfect dessert to pair it with, already prepared and perfectly balanced for everyone's individual tastes.

It wasn't always perfect or happy, this ever after of theirs. But it was _theirs_ , that they had crafted with their own two hands. A promise kept to each other.

It was home.

**Author's Note:**

> I first wrote this fic about 2 years ago, just after I finished listening to all of Balance. In that time, I've written a lot more and grown as a writer. I decided recently that I really wanted to see how much better I've gotten, and take one of my most popular fics and do a complete rewrite of it. Start at the beginning and just...write it again. I ended up adding 2200-ish new words to it (holy shit), and I'm so much happier with the little tweaks I've done. It doesn't feel quite as rushed to me as it used to.
> 
> I hope you enjoy this rewrite, especially if you read the original fic! I highly suggest trying this writing exercise for yourself sometime! Thank you so much for your continued love. <3


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